"It's up to you to decide what's right and what's wrong," Gordon said.

The Emmy-winning broadcaster kicked off the inaugural Presidential Lecture Series that will feature prominent speakers coming to Princess Anne to share their life's views and experiences.

Gordon, who grew up in Detroit, drew on his three decades of experience in front of and behind TV news cameras to share how he thinks images and messages today shape the thoughts and decisions - especially young Americans.

"I think the media, in a great degree, is omnipresent now because it's beyond just news trucks. It's everybody with a cell phone. It's everybody on social media," Gordon told WMDT prior to his lecture.

Gordon has traveled the world, reporting on major news stories, such as the Rodney King arrest and riots in Los Angeles and presidential elections.

"Think about how media affects your life," he told the gathering at the Student Services Center.

The media landscape over the past decade has changed dramatically, and not necessarily for the good, Gordon said. It is cluttered, to some degree, by social media that has the potential to make everyone a reporter, albeit untrained in how to present a broad spectrum of facts.

TV news operations often will broadcast an amateur YouTube video in an effort to appeal to a broader audience.

"Social media is the biggest change in the last 22 years," he said, "So before, you might have had a local (TV) or network report it. Now, everybody reports it."

"It's important for you to filter the perspective of what you're seeing," Gordon said.

"What we present is important," he said. "You need to adjust to your audience; you need to know what image you want to project."

"Be true to yourself, and everything will work out," Gordon said. "But remember, there are also consequences to be who you want to be. It's subtle, it's vocal, it is there."

"What we present is important," he said. "You need to adjust to your audience; you need to know what image you want to project."

Gordon cautioned students to "be selective finding someone to model."

"When you are branding yourself … as you move toward graduation and into a career, (think about) what is your message going to be? What are you going to present to the world?"